The Orb of Cairado

Chapter Three

A FTER HIS banishment from the Department of History, desperate for scholarly conversation, Ulcetha had gone to the salon of Dach’osmin Bruncavin, half convinced they would turn him away, too. But they let him in. The salon, held weekly in the ballroom of the Bruncavada compound, welcomed female scholars in all disciplines: historians, mathematicians, astronomers, literary scholars, philosophers. Osmin Vishnevin was a maza—a mazo, properly, but she said she did not like the word. The scholars were elves of all ages, from barely sixteen to well over ninety, and even if they were not all friends, none of them were enemies.

He was not the only man there. There were others who sympathized with the women’s ambitions and attended the salons to show support (the elderly Dach’osmer Bruncavar among them). Osmin Thorobin had even married one of them, becoming Osmerrem Ponevaran and the only married woman in regular attendance. “There are always women who try to do both,” Dach’osmin Bruncavin said sadly, “but so many men oppose learning for women that it is rare to find a husband who will permit his wife even to come here, much less to pursue her own studies.”

“And a woman in charge of a household, with children and servants and husband—and social duties, paying visits, being paid visits—so rarely has the time ,” said Osmin Narlezin.

“Time is the first thing one loses,” said Osmerrem Levornaran, a childless widow who had been welcomed back to the salon on her husband’s death. (From all Ulcetha could gather, Osmer Levornar was not much mourned, and for good reason.) “There’s always something more important than one’s own pursuits. Always .”

Ulcetha thought, but was not about to say, that if they thought being a married noblewoman was difficult, they should try being a shopkeeper’s wife, with all the same demands and only half the budget and only a maid-of-all-work to help. He was scared enough of betraying his bourgeois origin; he wasn’t going to confess to it.

Ulcetha assumed they knew of his disgrace—assumed, when he thought it over later, that that was exactly why they let him in, as another way to defy the men of the Department of History—but none of them was rude enough to say so, and the historians in particular welcomed him gladly. The coming of Edrevenivar was one of Cairado’s collective preoccupations, and three of the women were doing research that dovetailed with Ulcetha’s own. He had many fascinating conversations with Osmin Garmozhin, who had been studying the destruction of Vasthorno for forty years, and made Ulcetha’s own thesis on the subject look like a nursery rhyme. And Osmin Crelcorin was endlessly interested in the careers of Edrevenivar’s generals; she explained Edrevenivar’s southern campaigns far more clearly than Osmer Melorar had, and Ulcetha began to have at least a dim understanding of why some people specialized in military history.

And then—after he’d been there long enough, or said enough of the right things, he still didn’t know—they started inviting him to research in their family archives. This was a coup that would have had Ulcetha’s former friends drooling with envy. Access to family archives was a privilege the scholars first-class tended to keep for themselves, and the salon members went to considerable trouble to give Ulcetha access without letting their fathers and brothers know. Neli?n Mulabin’s was not the only window he had gone out of to escape detection. The women seemed to find it more amusement than nuisance, and Ulcetha could no more have turned down what they were offering than a starving man could have turned down a banquet.

He could not even say now how his relationship with Csecoro had transformed from research to intimacy, except that he was quite sure that it had been her idea to take things into the bedroom. He would never have had the nerve—courage or effrontery, depending on one’s point of view—to proposition Osmer Trenevar’s sister, although he could also admit that he hadn’t had the nobility of spirit to say no when she made the suggestion.

Despite the fact that he made more money as Salathgarad’s clerk than he had as a scholar second-class of the University, his life was not a happy one, but Csecoro was a good fraction of what made it bearable. He did not make the mistake of imagining it was anything serious to her—he was just trying to make it last as long as possible.

* * *

Ulcetha waited until after they had had sex to broach the matter.

Csecoro was lying naked across the bed, grinning up at the ceiling, her milk-white hair hanging in a great half unraveled braid over the side to the floor. Ulcetha, who was mostly responsible for the state of her hair, sat beside her and began working out the plaited knots and tangles. He said, “Wouldst do something for me?”

She turned her head to look at him upside down. Like most noble elven families in Cairado, the Trenevada had a hint of Barizheise blood several ancestors back in their family tree. In Csecoro, this manifested as a haze of gold in her large, pale gray eyes, making them almost opalescent and quite beautiful. “Anything,” she said. “What needst thou?”

“I need to talk to thy brother.”

“To Vora? Whatever for?”

Ulcetha winced but said carefully, “It is probably better if I don’t tell thee.”

“Ulcetha! What trouble hast thou found now?”

“It’s not trouble,” he said. “It might be the opposite of trouble. But Osmer Trenevar will quite rightfully be angry with me if I talk about it outside the Department.”

“Oh, the Department ,” said Csecoro. “May all the gods forfend we do anything to upset the Department. ” Csecoro would have been a scholar first-class by now if the University would have let her in.

“I’m sorry,” Ulcetha said.

“It isn’t thy fault. And, yes, I will gladly speak to Vora for thee. Thou wishest to speak with him. When and where?”

“Noon tomorrow at the sundial in the Gardens Melorinada.”

“Like something out of a novel,” Csecoro said, amused.

“I know,” Ulcetha said. “But it’s the best I can do. Tomorrow’s my day off, and I know of no better place.”

* * *

The Gardens Melorinada, which extended along both sides of the Athamara just outside the Third Wall, were lush with rhododendrons and azaleas and ordennas. They were laid out in spirals and knots and not-quite-mazes, and were an assignation point for all kinds of meetings; it was considered good manners to ignore anyone you encountered in the gardens who was not your assignee. Ulcetha, having ignored two women and an anxious-looking man, reached the sundial in its circle of palest pink azaleas a good twenty minutes early, and so had plenty of time to sit on a bench and rehearse what he was going to say.

Several people ignored him as they went by and he ignored them in turn.

The sundial, a great mosaic circle with a six-foot gnomon, was showing five minutes past noon when Osmer Vora Trenevar arrived.

Osmer Trenevar looked eerily like his sister, although they were not twins. The same cheekbones, the same arching eyebrows, and the same gray-gold eyes. The red first-class ribbons in his braids had been ironed that morning and stood out beautifully against his blue and gold brocade coat.

Ulcetha stood up nervously at his approach.

“Mer Zhorvena,” said Osmer Trenevar with a polite inclination of his head.

“Osmer Trenevar,” Ulcetha said. “Thank you for?—”

“Yes, yes. We can skip that part. What did you want to talk to me about?”

Ulcetha hesitated; then, forgetting all his carefully rehearsed, subtle lines, he blurted, “I found the Orish Veltavan.”

Osmer Trenevar stared at him in blank disbelief. “You… found the Orish Veltavan?”

“It was hidden in the Harceneise,” Ulcetha said. “I only found it because a…a friend who died in the wreck of the Wisdom of Choharo left me a clue.”

“ What? ”

Ulcetha explained as best he could, although he was afraid that more words did not make what had happened make more sense. “I don’t have any idea how Mara got the index number or how he knew what it was.” Or why he didn’t bring it to me straight away , but that was a question for midnight insomnia, not for a discussion with Osmer Trenevar.

Who looked like he’d been hit in the face with something heavy. “Do you…do you have it with you?”

He did, because he hadn’t been able to think of any other way to prove that he was telling the truth. He took it out of his pocket, unwrapped the black and plum scarf, and said, “Here. I really did find it.”

Osmer Trenevar looked at the Orish Veltavan carefully, without touching it. It was a strange looking object, a swirl of hardened gold wire strung with jewel chips. Osmer Aidrina had been convinced the positioning of the jewels was somehow important and had taken careful notes and measurements trying to figure out the directions and distances between them. Others had theorized there was a locked door somewhere in the Below-palace and the Orish Veltavan was a literal key. Ulcetha had tried but had been unable to imagine a lock with pin tumblers so eccentric that the Orish Veltavan would activate them. Everybody had had a theory, and it had looked like Osmer Aidrina would for once have no difficulty in staffing his expedition. But then the Orish Veltavan disappeared.

“And you’ve brought it,” Osmer Trenevar said, “to me. Why?”

“For help,” Ulcetha said. “I know how insane my story sounds. But if you vouched for me, I think even Osmer Harcenar would believe me.”

“Ah. And what do I get in return?”

“I…” Ulcetha had been prepared, more or less, for why should I believe you? But this question had not occurred to him. “What do you want?”

Osmer Trenevar smiled. “I want to find the Orb of Cairado before anyone else does.”

“All right,” Ulcetha said, “but I don’t see how?—”

“I’m sure poor Aidrina was right,” said Osmer Trenevar. “This is a map. All we have to do is figure out how to follow it.”

“You make that sound easy,” Ulcetha said, “but?—”

“Have you ever been to the Cleth Valley?”

“No,” Ulcetha said. Given his preference, he did not leave the city.

“That’s a shame,” said Osmer Trenevar. “Because it’s much easier to envision if you’ve seen the descent to the Below-palace. But I agree with Aidrina that this”—and he gestured along a length of wire that could have been the top or the bottom—“is that descent, and the first jewel here is what they call the Antechamber. And I think if you and I go out there with the Orish Veltavan, we’ll find other rooms of the caves that line up with the jewels.”

“Both of us? But you don’t need me along for that,” Ulcetha said.

“I’m not as foolish as Aidrina. I have no intention of going down there alone. And this is what I want. If you go with me and help me find the Orb of Cairado, I will vouch for you to Harcenar and the University Senate. You may take it or”—Osmer Trenevar shrugged fine-boned shoulders—“leave it.”

Ulcetha tried to think about Osmer Trenevar’s deal rationally, but there wasn’t really much to think about. “All right,” he said. “I’ll do it.”

“Good,” said Trenevar. “How soon can you be ready to leave?”

“ Leave? But don’t we need…I don’t know, equipment? Osmer Aidrina always?—”

“Aidrina had his own way of doing things,” Trenevar said dismissively. “I’ll take care of supplies. If you can pack lightly, we won’t need more than one pack horse.”

Ulcetha tried to adjust his definition of “packing lightly” down to what Trenevar seemed to mean. “All right,” he said, although he knew his ears reflected his dubiousness.

“Can you be ready to leave tomorrow?”

“ Tomorrow? ”

“I’m not teaching this quarter and have no reason to wait. Do you?”

Ulcetha thought about Salathgarad and his probable reaction to anyone asking for a week off. He thought with a sudden sensation of lightness that if this worked, and they found the Orb of Cairado, he would never have to see Salathgarad or that elegant office again. “No,” he said. “I suppose not.”

“Excellent. Then let’s meet at Princess Pavi?n’s Gate at…seven?”

Ulcetha was supposed to be at work at seven-thirty. “All right,” he said and hoped he would not regret it.